The global effect of cultural differences on sport should not be underestimated, and I
mean this quite sincerely. To underscore my point, let's examine an extreme sports
culture which exists right here in our very own nation. Let's call this case study:
NASCAR's Impact on the Sports Culture of North Carolina.
What makes North Carolina unique is quite simple: NASCAR. North Carolina is
the center of the NASCAR universe. To give you some scale of just how important
North Carolina is to the culture of NASCAR, in soccer you'd need to aggregate the
influence of Brazil, England, Argentina, and Holland for a similar reality.
Image Credit: Sports Illustrated, March 15, 2004 page 33, From the article "NASCAR's King"
by Richard Petty, Fantastic Illustration by Joe Ciardiello
NASCAR's success has been based on insuring that each race is
very entertaining by making the DRIVERS the focus of fan attention.
NASCAR's path to this end is through rules and regulations which
insure that no individual CAR enjoys a substantial advantage over
the other cars, theoretically creating a level playing field on which
the pit crews compete.
Did I say pit crews? It's just that so much of my precious NASCAR
viewing time is spent watching the pits crews change tires and wash
windshields that I do sometimes have trouble discerning which is
more important. But I have absolutely no trouble deciding which
I'd rather be watching. If I want to watch tires being changed I'll
spend the afternoon over at Discount Tires.
The reality is that the owners, pit crews, and drivers, are constantly
looking for ways to exploit the rules for even the slightest advantage.
Discover the advantage, and then "ride that horse" for as long as you
can, knowing that the window of opportunity will only exist for two
or maybe 3 weeks, since it is NASCAR's duty to shut down that
advantage, thereby "re-leveling" the playing field. It's the way the
NASCAR game is played.
So, NASCAR's fans look at their sports in a unique way. The
BEST teams and drivers are expected to exploit the rules, and they
should never apologize for doing so.
Now out on the track this really isn't the case, as after race apologies are common place,
usually coming from the victor as they explain the 'unintentional' car to car
contact which set
up the pass into 1st place, and ultimately the win. History has shown that a remorseful
driver has a better chance of retaining his win, even when that driver is involved in such
incidents on consecutive weekends. Understanding comes easy in the light of NASCAR's
desire for someone to step up and assume the position of "primary bad boy" which was
vacated by the death of "The Imtimidator", particularly when one considers
it in the context of the prevailing attitude of the sport:
Anything which leads to winning really can't be all that bad.
So, after decades of viewing sport through NASCAR colored glasses,
the sports culture of North Carolina has adapted this approach to
ALL of their sports:
Winning via gross rules exploitation is a natural and acceptable part of sport!
This attitude has given the coaches in the State of North Carolina a freedom to do pretty
much anything they wished in the pursuit of victory--so long as they don't break the rules.
So it shouldn't be a big surprise that North Carolina produced not one but two
coaches
who made their mark on college basketball by grossly exploiting the rules. Both yielded
examples of how we Americans expect the governing bodies of sport to fix obvious problems.
First, let's take a well known example involving the college basketball coach with the most
career wins: Coach Dean Smith. While publicly professing a personal philosophical disdain
for basketball's "zone" defense, the highly principled Coach Smith took the high road by
embracing the 'Four Corners Offense.' The infamous 'Four Corners Offense' featured a
pace of play so slow that 7-5 halftime scores
and 21-20 final scores were achieved by
teams under Coach Smith...and that was in tournament play. We can look to Coach Smith's
book "A Coach's Life" (page 81) for his updated rationale for utilizing this
low entertainment approach to basketball:
"We didn't want a good game. We wanted to win."
Fortunately, Coach Smith's peers in the coaching community had the strength of character
to resist this low production and low entertainment strategy. So the NCAA waited for
pressure to be placed on Coach Smith by the North Carolina Tarheel fans. It was a
long wait, however, as the Tarheel faithful viewed the "4 Corners Offense" as their
ticket to the winner's circle. Understanding that exploiting the rules was
the North Carolina way, they weren't about to call for the death of their own
"goose that laid the golden eggs." After all, it was the NCAA's job to change the rules-
-if indeed the "Four Corner Offense" was really that terrible.
Source: Fort Worth
Star-Telegram, March 29, 3003, page 1 (secondary headline)
Finally, after patiently waiting two or three seasons as Coach Smith spoiled
any number of college games, including an NCAA Tournament Final Game
("A Coach's Life", p. 173), the NCAA had no choice but to take action,
changing the rules of college basketball, implementing the shot clock,
in order to insure an enjoyable SHOW for the fans.
Addressing the objections which I've received regarding the "Dean Smith" example,
I do concede that it was simple for the NCAA to address a truly heinous problem
which involved a very limited number of bad apples. And my respondents' very valid
retort has been to remind me that the challenge which FIFA faces is much trickier:
How can FIFA attempt to fix a less grievous problem once every coach has
accepted it as a normal part of the game?
Luckily, the answer to this query can be found with just a very short cab ride from Chapel
Hill, NC to Raleigh, NC, where we can consider Coach Jim Valvano's impact on college
basketball. Prior to 1983, if a college team was down by 20 points with 4 minutes to go,
the coaches and fans understood that it was a great time for the loosing team to put in their
subs, which in turn signaled to the winning team that it was time to pull their starters off the
court and give the 8th thru 12th players on the bench a rare chance to play. That all changed
in 1983 when Coach Valvano won the NCAA Championship with a "Cinderella" NC State
team while employing an unusual yet very brilliant strategy:
"When behind with time running out...foul, foul, and foul again."
Unique to this example is that the college basketball broadcasters saw in Coach Valvano's
strategy a way to create interest in the final minutes of even the most one sided blowouts.
So, with the fervor of George Custer or Joan of Arc, the TV announcers advanced the idea
that Jimmy V. had opened our eyes to the fact that NO post 1983 game was ever truly
out of reach while there were players on the floor with fouls to spare. This pressure insured
that coaches everywhere were LOATH to ever use their 11th or 12th players. The entire
culture of NCAA men's basketball quickly succumbed to this disease, and the final minutes
of countless games became tedious free throw shooting contests.
While it took a bit longer to address the practice of excessive late game fouling, the NCAA
finally adjusted the rules of basketball to counter Coach Valvano's secret to success,
restoring some of the game's dignity in the process.
While very different, both of the above examples show exactly how
I expect the scoring problem to be resolved in professional soccer:
1. The problem has been identified.
2. It has been discussed by those who have the aptitude to do so.
3. A few years (but not DECADES!) go by...in hopes that the
problem fixes itself.
4. Solutions are being considered.
5. Hopefully, while we are still young, the rules of American pro soccer
will be altered in some way, shape, or form to fix the problem.
Continuing down the path of the basketball metaphor, let's examine what
happens when the rules makers underestimate the extent to which coaches
and players will go in the pursuit of victory. On Monday May 19, 2003
I sat through an NBA playoff game between our Dallas Mavericks and
the San Antonio Spurs. Mavericks Coach Don Nelson instructed the
Mavs to repeatedly foul a player with at least 10 minutes left in the games
FIRST HALF. Dallas players followed Coach Nelson's instructions to
the point of leaving the court to foul the player out of bounds.
No kidding! I saw it with my own eyes.
At half time a commentator spoke of how Coach Nelson was capitalizing on the fact that the
NBA's rules only address excessive intentional fouling in the last few minutes of a game, and
all announcers agreed that his plan to turn the game into a free throw shooting contest was
indeed smart stuff. It must have been, as the Mavericks finally came back to win the game.
The lesson here is rules which limit bad behavior in the final few minutes of a game only do
half the job, and underestimate the extent to which coaches and players will go to keep
from loosing.
Returning to my original point, this soccer scoring issue becomes much more complex with
the introduction of the sociological considerations. What if FIFA suspected that a
significant part of the soccer audience derived more pleasure from the celebration of the
score than from the goal itself? Could it be too much of a stretch to think that the "casual"
sports fan in South America or Africa or Italy would rather watch a replay of Zidane or
Vieri performing the "forbidden dance" with the corner flag, than to watch a replay of the
actual goal itself? I think not!
And if this were indeed the fact, it's only natural that FIFA would be reluctant to diminish
a possibly important aspect of the game, even if it's only important from an entertainment
point of view. I'm sure that FIFA realizes that the intensity and duration of post goal
celebrations would likely be greatly reduced in a 5-3 scoring reality.
I don't envy FIFA's job.
Lastly, I really do love North Carolina. In fact, I see myself retiring
there someday, 
as I can't think of a better way to finish my days on this Earth than windsurfing on
the flat water of the Pamlico Sound off the Outer Banks around Avon. Strapped
onto my O'brien 9.9 Epoxylite giant slalom board, fully powered by a steady
breeze and planing mile after mile. Oh yeah, wind surfing in North Carolina...
now that's heaven.
Mike "The Wind Master" Kimbro
Photo Credit: Windrider Magazine (April 1989, p. 91), photographer Darrell Jones
To return it's best to hit the 'back arrow' button above, or:
Visualize High Scoring Outdoor Soccer
For more on the sport of windsurfing, try the following:
Windsurfing Magazine The North Texas Wind Riders
Image Credit at right: Windsurfing Magazine Fall 2004 Issue, Article Entitled "12 Great Places You'd Rather Be" by Eric Sanford and Jay Kohn, page 69
Raining cats and dogs when I got into Corpus Christi, I followed the signs to the Aircraft Carrier USS Lexington. Complete with a movie theater, my plans of a one hour in and out happily became three hours:
Later that afternoon at Corpus Christi's Bird Island Basin, it's the story of a man and his board. Following is a pictorial in praise of the most beautiful sailboard ever made, my 1989 O'Brien Epoxy Lite 9.9:
Above, local Corpus Christi windsurfer Trina and her incredible van.
For more information on windsurfing Corpus Christi contact Worldwinds Windsurfing at http://www.worldwinds.net/
Image Credit: Windsurfing Magazine Fall 2004 Issue, Article Entitled "12 Great Places You'd Rather Be" by Eric Sanford and Jay Kohn, page 69